Page 5 of Anatomy of a Meet Cute
“How was LA? And your mom? Was she still”—Jehan paused, wiggling her perfectly shaped eyebrows—“weird about the move?”
“Not as weird as I expected. Mom just sort of pretended that she hasn’t stopped speaking to me, which was strange because then she’d do things like pass Isaiah the salt to give to me when I asked for it. But whatever. On the upside, my brother seems happy,” Sam said, lettingher eyes come to rest on the TV remote just as Duke picked it up to turn down the volume. Her brother had left for Los Angeles about six months before she’d moved. To say her mother took the news of his departure poorly would have been generous. When Sam moved to the Bay Area to start her fellowship, her mother had gone nuclear. Starting with a fit of tears that rapidly turned into a series of but-you-can’t-even-make-a-frittata-how-will-you-survive-on-your-own phone calls, and when that didn’t work, the silent treatment.
Sam would be lying if she said the cold shoulder hadn’t broken her heart. In the past, she would have even given in to her mother’s demands, but she couldn’t be in two places at once. She would figure out how to make it in the Bay Area, and her mother would adjust sooner or later. Maybe.
“Okay, but she didn’t freak out on you again?” Duke asked. There was less wiggle in his eyebrows but just as much curiosity in his tone.
“No. I think the tantrum-throwing phase is officially over. Now it’s just the awkward let’s-talk-at-Christmas phase.” Sam laughed, mostly to cover up the sting. Diana Holbrook had basically put her daughter on ice once Sam accepted a highly coveted spot as a research fellow with San Francisco Central Hospital. She’d done the first phase of her residency in a public hospital back in Ohio before applying for the fellowship. At SF Central she would learn how to run her own research program focusing on pregnancy and public policy interventions. This wasn’t training that she could get just anywhere, but as far as her mother was concerned, she could deliver babies in Akron just the same as she could in San Francisco.
“Did your mom actually saylet’s talk at Christmas?” Jehan asked. If Sam hadn’t known the shock on her face was sincere, she would have laughed. Jehan genuinely thought the best of everyone, including the semiferal cats outside their apartment that tried to claw her face off if she got within ten feet.
“Not in so many words,” Sam said, kicking her legs out in front of her. Her roommates knew that as fickle as her mother sounded, Sam missed her. Sure, her mom had a list of expectations a mile long that Sam never seemed to meet, but she was also loving when she wanted to be. After all, this was the same woman who’d read Sam one children’s book about thirty-five times a day without complaint for six months. Never mind that Sam had the book memorized. It was the sound of her mother’s voice that was comforting, especially when her dad was away and her brother had the nerve to go to big-kid school without her.
Sam scratched at a fray in the fabric of the couch, trying to decide how to explain their complicated relationship. “I think my brother hoped we’d all eat tacos and hug it out, but Mom’s not there yet.”
“Do you think she’ll ever come around?” A crease formed along either side of Jehan’s mouth as she frowned.
“Maybe.” Sam stopped pulling at the fabric, then said, “But in my experience, it’s better to just let her come to you. Mom’s a fine line you have to walk. If I ask her for anything, she thinks I’m incompetent. But if I don’t ask for enough, she thinks I’ve forgotten she exists. Better to just let sleeping dogs lie.”
“That’s blood, Sam. You’ll have to work it out, eventually.” Duke’s southern drawl wrapped around her. The guy managed to be both relentlessly pragmatic and good humored at all times. It was part of the reason why Sam had agreed to room with him and Jehan after exactly three seconds of talking to them during the hospital’s informal New Fellows Weekend.
“Eventuallybeing the key word.” Sam smiled and eyed her friend, who scratched a day’s worth of fine stubble clinging to his chin before stretching up.
“Sounds like you’re just bein’ stubborn, but have it your way.” He grinned, the deep lines of his smile stretching across the dark skin of his otherwise ageless face.
“I will, thank you.” Sam smiled. Noticing the papers spread out in front of Jehan, she asked, “What’s all that?”
Jehan lit up like the Bat-Signal, a massive grin crossing her face. “They are marriage license applications.” She paused for dramatic effect, and Sam could have sworn she saw Duke flinch. “Because Travis asked me to marry him!”
“Oh. Wow,” Sam said, forcing brightness into her tone. Her roommate’s engagement was the exact opposite of what she’d hoped would happen. Travis had come with Jehan to the New Fellows Weekend, and he left Sam and Duke with a sour taste in their mouths. After spending six minutes with the guy, Sam decided he was clingy and controlling. He spent three-quarters of the weekend asking Jehan why she couldn’t stay in Washington, DC, where he worked as an analyst for a bank, and the last quarter glaring at anyone who didn’t recognize him as the sole reason Jehan was matched with such a prestigious program. This last part was nearly impossible to give him credit for, since Jehan was an actual badass.
“That is so exciting. Can I hug you?” Sam asked, standing up and forcing Duke to take his feet off the ottoman so she could reach her friend, who bounced off the couch like she was a rubber ball.
“Yes! Thank you. I didn’t expect it at all,” Jehan said, hugging Sam as if her excitement were transferable.
“How did it happen?” Sam asked, pulling back and reaching for Jehan’s left hand.
“Oh, I don’t have a ring yet. He asked me over Zoom.” Sam could almost hear Duke’s eyes rolling from across the room, but that didn’t slow Jehan’s joy. “I guess he was just so excited about the idea that he couldn’t wait until he saw me next.”
“Smart man,” Duke said, a good-natured look scrawled across his face as if he were reminding Sam to act ecstatic, before standing up and shuffling toward the kitchen, the top of his six-foot-four frame nearly grazing a low-hanging light fixture as he went.
“Well, that is fantastic.” Sam took a step back so she could see Jehan’s face. “I know it just happened, but have you thought about a date at all?”
Jehan’s smile faltered slightly, but she picked it up so fast Sam hardly had time to notice. “Well, that’s being discussed. He wants to get married ASAP. I believe his exact words were ‘let’s wait just long enough to prove you are not pregnant.’” She laughed, shaking her long hair over her shoulder. “But I want something more traditional, the whole big Egyptian engagement party, and then set a date.”
Sam smiled. “Obviously it’s up to you two, but—”
“I’d throw the party,” Duke shouted from his room, interrupting Sam as she searched for nicer words to say the same thing.
Rolling her eyes, Sam called back, “You already had your chance to weigh in last week.” From somewhere down the hall, Duke chuckled as she turned her attention back to her friend. “But Duke is right. Take your time with this. Planning a wedding during the first year of your fellowship seems like a lot ... unless you’re secretly pregnant?”
Jehan laughed at Sam’s half-assed attempt at a joke. “No. Although throwing a big engagement party is probably just as much work as my fellowship.”
“Yeah, but it’s work you want to do,” Sam said, releasing her hands. “Besides, didn’t you, like, triple major while working two jobs in undergrad?”
“It was a double major,” Jehan snorted as if the adjustment made her less impressive.
“But one was in nanorobotics,” Duke said, walking out of his bedroom. “Sam, didn’t you read theMeet the Hospitalguide?”
